The source of all your favorite spirits

Pretty much every spirit known to man begins life as some sort of plant: sake began with a grain of rice; scotch emerged from barley; tequila from agave; rum from sugarcane; and bourbon from corn. In The Drunken Botanist, Amy Stewart explores how humans have, through ingenuity, inspiration, and sheer desperation, contrived to transform all matter of plant life into alcohol over the centuries. She’s with Mark Perzel this morning for a little liquor education.